The following article was brought to my attention by a reader, who has also provided a copy of his related letter to Greg Hunt MP (below).
The implications of this story for Australia’s public policy on addressing “climate change” are profound.
In effect, what the following revelation means is this.
Australia, under our Green-Labor-Independent dictatorship, will be deliberately undermining our own coal-fired electricity sector via the Government’s no-mandate imposition of a carbon “X” scheme; we will then be buying some $3 Billion per annum worth of carbon dioxide credits from countries such as China and India; they will be able to sell us their UN-provided free carbon credits, while at the same time, buying our coal to burn in their UN-subsidised coal-fired powerplants.
Read on, and be stunned at the insanity of green totalitarianism’s global policy of reduce-all-to-the-lowest-common-denominator:
Environmentalists criticized the United Nations on Tuesday after it ruled that a large Indian coal-fired power project is eligible to earn carbon credits worth $165 million at current prices.
Several green organizations said the U.N. rules, or methodology, applied to the 4,000 MW supercritical plant owned by Reliance Power were flawed and that the project was viable without the sweeteners of tradable carbon credits called certified emissions reductions (CERs).
The power station, in Krishnapatnam in Andhra Pradesh, is the second Reliance Power project to be formally registered by the United Nations under its Clean Development Mechanism.
In total, five high-efficiency coal power plants have been registered under the CDM — four in India and one in China — meaning they are all eligible to earn CERs that they can sell.
The five registered power projects involve two from Reliance Power totaling 8,000 MW, two projects totaling 2,640 MW from Adani Power and a 2,000 MW ultra-supercritical plant by Shenergy in China.
According to U.N. data, the five projects are eligible to receive a total of 68.2 million CERs over a 10-year crediting period. That is worth 661 million euros ($919 million) based on current prices of CERs traded on the European Climate Exchange of 9.70 euros.
Reliance’s Krishnapatnam plant will receive 12.3 million CERs and the firm’s other 4,000 MW plant, Sasan Power in Madhya Pradesh, will receive 22.5 million.
You read that right.
5 coal-fired powerplants in China and India are to receive hundreds of millions worth of free carbon credits from the UN.
They will profit from selling those free permits – quite possibly to Australia, thanks to our Government’s plan to deliberately undermine our international competitiveness – while burning our coal in their power plants.
The reader who kindly provided the link to the above article has also provided a copy of his letter to Opposition Climate Action spokesman, Greg Hunt MP. Regular readers will be familiar with Mr Hunt’s penchant for equivocation and obfuscation when challenged, from his recent exchange with your humble blogger ( “Letter To Greg Hunt MP” ), and so will not be at all surprised to learn that his response to our reader’s letter was similarly brief, obfuscatory, and inane.
Please read on for further insights into the cold hard reality, that our card-carrying Green cargo-cult politicians all wilfully choose to ignore –
Hi,
Firstly please don’t think I am going to bombard you with emails, I’m not – far too busy for a kickoff! 🙂 but this is too insane and serious to not bring to your attention.
http://www.eco-business.com/news/carbon-credits-for-india-coal-
power-plant-stoke-criticism/A massive coal-based project in India is now earning carbon credits in the hundreds of thousands a year, the exact opposite outcome of our carbon tax from the same basic facts.
What is significant in this is that local coal producers and users such as energy plants are being smashed by the carbon tax, which is based directly (allegedly) on UN guidelines, the IPCC and the Clean Development Mechanism Kyoto Protocols.
So how can the same “rules” credit coal plants in India and lead to our coal plants being taxed to hell and gone?
That clearly means there is a misapplication of the rules, and a fatally serious one, either in India, or here.
If it’s in India, the whole credit system at the UN is called into question. If that’s the case, our own carbon tax is following a dead end and has to stop immediately.
If the problem is here, we must immediately adopt changes to the proposed carbon law (or better yet kill it, but…) so as to reflect the same rulings here as India enjoys. In the process, that would, through carbon accounting, greatly reduce our carbon footprint, at the stroke of a pen, rather than through merciless economic warfare on our engine room industries.
There is a very VERY lively insider discussion on this in the carbon trade industry right now. Ugly arguments over carbon accounting and carbon auditing, the principle of additionality and just exactly what we wouldn’t want if the ETS type approach is to work.
Madness.
What is particularly serious about this situation is that the DCCEE should have been all over this issue like a cheap suit. To the best of my knowledge no one from junior time server up to the minister even has the faintest clue this situation has occurred. I did try and tell them a year ago but they are yet to reply to that email.
How ironic.
If the Gillard gang do what the do best – nothing – we will be in a situation where our own government is penalising our coal industry, AND forcing them to buy credits after a few years of soaking them with a tax… At the exact same time as India not only does not have a penalty tax (their carbon tax on coal is a pittance), but they are now allowed to earn credits from coal. Coal is the most abundantly used industrial fuel source in India and its region.
This means they will now be paid by the UN carbon trade to use coal, be allowed to trade in credits freely, escape any of their own taxation, and see our own coal industry become totally and completely irrevocably non competitive.
This carbon tax has scaled the dizzying heights of lunacy in less than a week, and I say that as a carbon trader. This is just nuts.
I am back in Australia as of Saturday, and am making myself available at once to brief any or all of you or any coal industry personnel who need to understand this. This has got no press but it is a big deal. It empowers India (and China) to triple dip on their coal use whilst the bozo gillard government destroys Australia’s power base.
Politically I also hope this can be used to devastating effect during La Gillard’s “Endless Bummer” walking tour of Australia. I know the situation described is somewhat technical but it comes down to this:
Why are we taxing coal into oblivion under the same system that is rewarding India for using coal?
We will end up buying credits for our coal from India’s coal. Huh?
China will follow India in this.
China will then be exploiting our down spiral economy by buying coal cheap, earning credits on that coal in China, then selling the credits back to us. HUH?
The DCCEE is ASLEEP! And that’s probably good because when they’re awake- something in our economy dies.
All the best to you, and if this has been any use at all I am very glad.
(Name withheld for privacy)
Barnaby Is Right 
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